The present invention relates to conveyor systems, and more particularly to the induction section of a conveyor system.
Induction subsystems of conveying systems often serve the function of preparing articles on the conveying systems for being processed by a downstream sortation system. Such processing typically involves controlling the articles in such a way that the articles leaving the induction subsystem have gaps between them that are close to a desired length. The desired length may be variable depending upon the length and/or width of one or more of the pair of articles that define the gap, or the desired length may be constant. Regardless of the criteria used to determine the length of the desired gap, the gap serves the purpose of facilitating the sortation of the articles. That is, sortation subsystems often function more effectively if the articles being sorted have a certain minimum gap between them. However, gaps exceeding this minimum will generally decrease the throughput of the conveying system. It is therefore desirable to create gaps that balance sortation criteria with acceptable throughput criteria.